London Olympics Volleyball Preview

The Thirteenth Indoor Volleyball Olympic Tournament will get underway in the city of London at the Earls Court Exhibition Center. In a history dominated by the Soviet Nations, the sport has of late seen emergence of western power houses. Defending Champions USA and Brazil in Men’s and Women’s categories respectively, will try and replicate their 2008 Beijing  performance indoors accompanied by its beach game counterpart.

Number of Events : 4
( Men’s Indoor , Women’s Indoor , Men’s Beach , Women’s Beach )

Number of Medals on offer : 4 Golds , 4 Silvers , 4 Bronzes

When to Watch ?

 Men’s Indoor                                        Women’s Indoor

Groups : 29th July to 6th August                Groups : 28th July to 5th August
QF : 8th August                                                   QF : 7th August
SF : 10th August                                                 SF : 9th August
Medal Round : 12th August                           Medal Round : 11th August

With the back drop of the 2011 FIVB World Championships that took place in Japan , followed by a number of Olympic Qualifiers we have a list of 12 Nations divided into 2 Groups, that will take part in London 2012. Hosts Great Britain along with six other European Nations in the Men’s indoor event will try and reinforce their supremacy whereas the women’s indoor event will see a balance of continents with countries like Algeria and Dominican Republic in fray along with China , Japan and Korea from Asia. Beijing Olympics Bronze Medal winners and 2011 North American Champions, Cuba (Men), did not qualify for the London Olympics!

Teams (Men) : GB, Brazil, Italy, Russia, Poland, USA, Argentina, Serbia, Bulgaria, Germany, Australia, Tunisia

Teams (Women) : GB, USA, Japan, Brazil, Italy, China, Russia, Serbia, DR, Turkey, Algeria, Korea

Predictions

Men’s Indoor                       Women’s Indoor
GOLD : POLAND                    GOLD : ITALY
SILVER : RUSSIA                     SILVER : USA
BRONZE : BRAZIL                   BRONZE : CHINA

Team to look out for : USA      Team to look out for : Brazil

Indian Interest

No , India has not qualified infact we have never qualified for Olympic Volleyball since its inception in 1964 Tokyo Games. But we did participate in the Men’s indoor volleyball qualification rounds owing to a top 6 finish in the 2011 Asian Men’s Volleyball Championship in Tehran. The Olympic Qualifiers were held in Berlin from 8th-10th June 2012. Having being placed in a tough group, consisting of hosts Germany, Cuba and the Czechs , India went down tamely in all the three games of the round robin competition and bowed out of Olympic contention.

Detailed Group A and Group B analysis coming up…